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in need of a good weeding, while the newer were closer to the front.  
    “I wish you were here, Mama.”
    Looking over the headstones to where that voice had come from, he saw a lady sitting beside a grave. Her head was uncovered and lowered. Red-gold hair hung in a long, thick, plaited rope down her spine. Will felt his heart skip a beat as he stared at the back of Olivia Langley’s head. She was the only woman he knew that had hair the color of sunset. Her mother must have passed away sometime in the last five years. Will felt a twinge of sadness for the vivacious lady who had always had a smile for him whenever they met.
    “I promised you I would look after them. Do you remember, Papa? When you died, I came up here and said I would do whatever it takes to give them a safe and happy future.”
    He should not intrude on her grief; he should go, turn around and walk away before she saw him, but he couldn’t get his legs to move.  
    “But I didn’t think it was going to be so hard.”
    Christ, she was crying, soft sobs that tore at his insides because they were the sound of someone whose heart was broken. His feet carried him forward and soon he stood behind her.  
    She was on her knees. One of her bare hands clutched a headstone and her head was bowed in defeat. Will read the two stones and realized that both Lord and Lady Langley had died since his departure.
    Will had thought about Olivia a lot since he had left, about the days they had spent walking over the hills of Twoaks talking of everything and anything. With her, he had always managed to drop the façade he had erected to shut everyone out. With her, he had been a man who had nothing to prove, a man happy with the company he was keeping. Looking at her ring-less fingers, he had the answer to one of the questions that had plagued him, and knew he had no right to feel pleased about her unmarried state.
    “Olivia, don’t be alarmed. It is I, William Ryder.”
    His words had been spoken softly, yet Will watched her fingers briefly clench around the headstone, the knuckles turning white before releasing it.  
    “Please accept my sincere condolences for the loss of your parents. They were lovely people.”
    Still she didn’t look at him, but sat back on her heels, her hands now in her lap, head lowered.  
    “I lost my parents, as you know, many years ago, yet still I miss them. It is almost as if the world is in some way depleted with their passing. Of course, I had you to thank for helping me through their deaths, Olivia. You walked endless miles over these hills listening to me talk as I tried to come to terms with the grief.”
    She was listening to him. He could tell because her cries had stopped. There was just the occasional hitch in her breathing.
    “To say it eases would lessen what they meant to us, Olivia, yet given time we learn to live with their death.”
    She seemed so small, huddled in front of him, worn black cloak hanging behind her. Eyeing the patches around the hem, he wondered just how hard Olivia Langley was finding things. The sad little figure before him was a complete contrast to the delectable young lady who had once brought him to his knees with just a look.
    “Come, take my hand, Olivia, and we shall sit on the seat above the cemetery and look down at the village of Two Oakes while we become reacquainted.”
    He heard her sniff.  
    “I-it seems you have been gone too long, my lord, if you now pronounce the village’s name like an outsider.” Her voice was thick with tears.
    “I had just come to that realization, Olivia, hence my return home. Now come, you need to get up off this cold ground,” Will added, putting his hand under her elbow. She gave a sharp hiss of breath.
    “Are you hurt, Olivia?”
    “No, my lord, you just startled me.”
    Placing his hands on her waist, Will simply lifted her to her feet when she made no move to stand. She was light as a feather and he could tell she had lost some of the soft curves that